My First Model Casting

To fully understand what is involved in being a model I tagged along to my sister’s casting for a ‘young designers, fashion show. When we arrived at the casting there were a few professional looking models and I must admit I was feeling a little intimidated by their height and figures.

One at a time the models walked in and out of a room that nobody seemed to know what exactly was going on in there. My turn came and hesitantly I purposefully walked in slowly. It was a big empty room with three casting agents sitting at a table (like the judges on XFactor) at the top of the room, two of which were women.

Never taking their eyes off me from the moment I walked in, I got closer and saw the smiles on their faces which made me feel at ease. The first thing I was asked was my name and then I was told to take off my coat and put on my heels.

Then I was asked to cat walk across the room and pose for two seconds, after two rounds of that they stopped me and one of them got up and showed me two types of walks explain as she went then turned to me and said “your turn to go”.

So I walked all the while thinking to my self, don’t trip and trying to remember all the things to do long strides, turn on foot that last touches the ground, keep chin up, fierce with energy, slow and delicate, cross legs...information over load.

When I was through they took a photo, asked me for my number, if I was available for fittings and for my measurements which I did not have except for my height and my shoe size.

This made me realise that it’s not as easy as a lot of people think it is, at castings you compete against a group of talented girls to get work and by watching my sister at a photo shoot I saw how there is a lot of waiting to get lights adjusted for your skin tone or for the look they are going for, holding an awkward pose in uncomfortable and sometimes painful shoes. It can also be lonely because a models works and travels on their own most of the time and long hours are involved at fittings, dress rehearsal and make-up.

Unfortunately taking photos inside was not allowed.